Steve Eyre hailed match-winner Jason Kennedy as Rochdale made it back-to-back wins with victory over Scunthorpe last night.

Dale followed up their first three-point haul of the season at Bury on Saturday with a slender win over the Iron at Spotland, Kennedy’s second-half strike proving the difference between the teams.

Dropped to the bench for the weekend’s derby win at Gigg Lane, Kennedy made the most of his opportunity on returning to the starting XI in place of the suspended Nicky Adams.

“I was delighted for Jason Kennedy because he is such a good professional, a good person and a good player – I’m really pleased he was the match-winner,” said Eyre, whose side successfully shut out the opposition for first time this season.

“The clean sheet was the key to victory,” added Eyre. “We’ve been having conversations for the last month about the importance of not conceding goals and even though Scunthorpe had lots of possession and we were forced to play deep at times, I felt we defended well and looked comfortable in our own penalty area. That was down to the fact we have trained so well.”

The deadlock was broken in the 59th minute when Ashley Grimes’ curling shot was parried by Johnstone straight into the path of Kennedy who accepted the gift, slipping the ball into the unguarded goal from six yards.

Scunthorpe launched a late rally, Bobby Grant seeing a header cleared off the line by Widdowson in time added on, while former Dale striker Chris Dagnall had a close-range shot charged down by Pim Balkestein.